The change in Eighth Amendment cruel and unusual punishment standards Research Paper

The change in Eighth Amendment cruel and unusual punishment standards in death penalty cases since Furman v. Georgia (1972) - Research Paper Example Here, courts need to look for factors on how to change the standards of community and also come up with independent evaluation if the statutes are reasonable. For instance, in the case of Furman V. Georgia, the jury invalidated the death penalty regulation at that time because they constituted the unusual punishment and cruelty against the eighth amendment. The eighth amendment is an American amendment that bars or prevents the government from practices that may result to the violation of the freedom of people (Smith, 2010). It prevents the government from imposing cruel and unusual punishment such as torture and excess bails and fines. This amendment was adopted as early as 1791. Death sentence is a practice of the state where people are sentenced to death due to the magnitude of their crime. It is also commonly referred to as capital punishment. Overtime death penalty was not highly considered as a violation of this amendment. There were no vivid cases that had being presented there before to show the brutality of death sentence and how it imposed cruel and unusual punishment to people. This was until 1972 when a United State Supreme Court decision called the Furman v. Georgia was ruled. The case had being presented by three black men including Furman who had being sentenced to death. In this ruling, the court declared that death penalty violated the eighth amendment. However the court did not view death penalty as a cruel and unusual punishment. The case led to a de facto moratorium on capital punishment. The court argued that the manner in which the death sentences were being imposed was capricious. People were being sentenced to death in an erratic manner. However this ruling by the court was not taken well by the country. People argued that there are some crimes whose best solution was a death sentence. In 1976 the court reviewed the case due to statutes presented by the states of